The story follows Musashi, a young swordsman who is summoned to a parallel world to defend the Allucaneet Kingdom from the Thirstquencher Empire.

Development began in early 1997, and was directed by Yoichi Yoshimoto, produced by Yusuke Hirata, and scored by Tsuyoshi Sekito.

After Musashi recovers Lumina, he finds that most of the people from the Allucaneet kingdom, including Fillet, have been kidnapped by the Thirstquencher Empire.

With help from treasure hunter Jon, Musashi finds the Earth Scroll and defeats its crest guardian.

Musashi then continues his journey, finds the Wind Scroll, and defeats its crest guardian in an ants' nest.

Thirstquencher's leader, Flatski, forces Musashi to give him Lumina in exchange for the Princess, and frees the Sky Crest.

[2] The other sword is Lumina, a large, double-edged weapon which cannot be effectively used in combos by itself; instead, it can be imbued with elemental properties from Scrolls.

To pass time, the player may also opt to collect the various action figures – which resemble more detailed models of nearly all the characters and monsters – available at the town toy store, which stocks new items at the start of every chapter.

While the game was conceptualized as action-oriented, Musashi was originally meant to be a wanderer, but was later changed to an itinerant Samaritan in order to have him interacting and helping other characters.

Director Yoichi Yoshimoto focused on the game's fully polygonal aspects that were a departure from Square's previous works.

[13] The Brave Fencer Musashiden: Original Soundtrack was released by DigiCube in Japan on July 23, 1998; it consists of 78 tracks spanning two compact discs in a boxset.

[13] After the game was done, the team was merged with those behind Parasite Eve II, Mana and Chrono Cross to make Final Fantasy XI.

[20] GameSpot reviewer James Mielke praised the graphics of the Japanese import, calling them "very well done" and superior to other Square RPGs of the time.

[29] IGN and GamePro's reviews by Randy Nelson and Robinson Hood, respectively, similarly praised the game's "excellent visual design".

[29] Both GameSpot and IGN felt that the comparison was invalid, as Musashi focused much more on action than role-playing, resulting in a game that was not a direct competitor at all.

[29][30] Next Generation said, "At the heart of Brave Fencer is an engaging and challenging (if somewhat simple) journey with some very clever features and an endearing cast.

"[31] Edge gave the Japanese import eight out of ten, saying, "With Square yet to release a truly bad game on the PlayStation, Brave Fencer Musashiden is yet another example of the ways in which the company is pushing the boundaries of its core RPG market without risking an expensive and reputation-damaging experiment.